Janine Armin: Toronto Noir

For some reason, the gesture enraged Billy. The blood drained from his face and he aimed a kick at the boy’s leg. “That’s right, asshole,” he said. “Peace and love.”

Some of the other kids were emerging from their sleeping bags, rubbing their eyes and trying to get their heads around what was going on. Billy’s wiry body was a coiled spring.

“Keep it up, you sorry little pieces of shit!” he yelled. “The more you smoke and screw, the more useless you become. And that works for me. You don’t know who I am, but I know who you are. Every day I serve your fathers their lunch. While you’re lying in parks getting crabs and blowing your minds, your fathers are transforming this city from Toronto the Good into Toronto the Great. Go ahead and laugh, but you’re the reason I’m going to be part of Toronto the Great. You want to know why? Because you’re breaking your fathers’ hearts. You’re the reason they order double martinis every day and get loose-lipped about the projects that are going to change this city forever.”

The jaw of the boy Billy hit was starting to swell, but he kept the faith. It was an effort for him to form the words, but he managed. “Chill, brother,” he said.

Billy shot the boy a look of pure hate. “Fuck you,” he said, then he grabbed my hand and dragged me after him out of the park.

“If I had $1,000,000 I’d be rich.”

— Toronto musicians The Barenaked Ladies

Billy was silent till we got to Bloor Street. “Are you okay?” I said finally.

When he turned toward me, there was a new darkness in his eyes. “Yeah, I’m okay. I’m more than okay. I’m terrific. I deserve to make it. When Toronto’s a world-class city, I should be one of the kings. I’m smart. I’ve got drive and I’ve got nerve. The only thing I don’t have is money.” His voice broke, and for a terrible moment I thought he was going to cry. “I know where this city is headed. And I’ve got plans — great plans — I just don’t have the money to get started. And that means I’m fucked.”

“You can save,” I said.

“From what I earn at Winston’s? Fuck!” He laughed. “Only one thing to do. Wait for Vova to die.”

“What would that change?”

His laugh was short and bitter. “I’m in Vova’s will. It’s supposed to be a big secret, but I’m the heir. Vova lost touch with his people in Russia years ago. He says they’re probably dead by now. Anyway, one night when he got drunk, he started obsessing about how the government was going to take his house after he died. I told him that if he had a will, the government couldn’t touch his property. So he poured himself another shot and wrote out a will leaving everything to me.”

“How come you never told me?”

“Because I made a promise to Vova.” Billy’s voice was suddenly weary. “Also because it doesn’t fucking matter. Vova has the heart of an ox. He’ll live to be a hundred.”

“He drinks a lot.”

Billy shook his head. “Yeah, maybe I’ll get lucky, and some Saturday night he’ll get loaded and walk under the wrong ladder.”

“Things work out for the best,” I said, but for once my mind wasn’t on Billy’s future. It was on my own. My period was three weeks late, and as a rule, I was regular as clockwork.

“Come in and get lost.”

— Slogan of Honest Ed’s Discount House,

Bloor and Bathurst

Years later, when my son came home from school and told me that the flapping of a butterfly’s wings can cause a chain of events that ultimately causes or prevents a tornado, I thought of the summer of 1967, when the flapping of the wing of a single butterfly in Russia changed four lives in Toronto.

By the time the Canadian National Exhibition opened at the end of August, I still hadn’t told Billy we were going to have a baby. For days, his mood had been as sullen as the weather. He had a line on some land north of Toronto that was going cheap, but the regular customers at Winston’s were on holidays, and tips were down. For the first time since he came to the city, Billy had been forced to dip into his savings to make ends meet, and his anger was building. I could see it in the set of his jaw and in the new fierceness of his temper. When I suggested we forget our troubles by spending an evening on the midway, he tensed and balled his fists. I flinched, and Billy saw my fear and gave me a melting smile.

“Okay, babe. Tomorrow’s Saturday. I’ll have my Saturday night drink with Vova — got to keep on his good side. Then after I pour him into bed, we’ll go to the Ex. We’ll eat some cotton candy. I’ll win you one of those fancy satin dolls on the midway; then we’ll take in the fireworks. Good times!”

Good times. But for Billy and me, good times always carried a price. The next day, when I came home from work, Billy was waiting for me on the front steps. He was ashen. As soon as he spotted me, he grabbed my hand and dragged me away from the house.

“My fucking luck,” he said, his voice cracking. “I answered the phone today when Vova was out doing errands. It was long distance, and I couldn’t make out what the person on the other end was saying. We yelled at each other for a couple of minutes trying to make one another understand, then somebody who said he was Vova’s nephew came on the line. His English was excellent. He told me that he was crying with happiness to finally locate his uncle, because he had found a way to get to Canada and be reunited with Vladimir Maksimovich. So that’s that. The nephew comes to Toronto. He gets the house, and I get the shaft. My fucking luck.”

Billy was as low as I’d ever seen him, so I did what girls in the movies did when their men were down. I put my arms around him and murmured encouragement. “You always tell me people make their own luck,” I said.

I was a naïve nineteen-year-old trying to make the man I loved feel better, but my words transformed Billy. It was as if I’d ignited a fuse in his brain and the possibilities were shooting forth. He pounded his fist into his hand. “You’re right. We make our own luck.” His eyes were burning, absorbed in a vision that only he could see. He grabbed me by the shoulders. “Babe, you’re going to have to make yourself scarce for a while.”

“What about the fireworks?”

“We’ll make it in time for the fireworks. I promise you.” His grip on my shoulders tightened.

“Billy, you’re hurting me.”

“If we don’t do this right, you’re going to be hurting a lot more. Now don’t ask questions. Just follow instructions. Go up to your room, stay there, and listen for the phone downstairs in the hall. If it rings, grab it — quickly. Tell whoever it is that Vova’s not here.”

“But if you and Vova are in the kitchen, he’ll hear the phone.”

“I’ll put the radio on the crazy station that plays Russian music and crank it up.”

“Billy, what are you going to do?”

He shrugged and gave me a sly smile. “Same thing I do every Saturday night — have a drink with my pal, Vova.”

“Toronto will never be the same again.”

— Phil Givens, Mayor of Toronto

I did what Billy told me to do. I went to my room, opened the window, and sat staring into the sultry twilight, listening. The weekly drinks were a ritual. Vova never opened a bottle until Saturday night, and then he drank till the bottle was empty. Billy’s job was to pour the vodka, listen, and get Vova safely into bed. It never took long. Vova put in long hours, and he drank fast. That night, I could hardly breathe as I listened to the mournful tunes of Russian radio and the voices of the two men: Billy’s baritone, playful, deferring; Vova’s bass, booming louder as the level of the bottle dropped. Our landlord’s conversational topics were limited: his hatred of all government; his contempt for rules and regulations; his pride in his self-reliance and accomplishments. As I heard the familiar litany, I relaxed. It was just another Saturday night, after all. Then the phone downstairs in the hall rang, shrill and insistent, and my heart began to pound. I raced to answer it. It was long distance. I broke the connection, and left the phone off the hook. In that instant, I knew that nothing would ever be the same again.